MLK Archives - Not Even Past

King: Pilgrimage to the Mountaintop by Harvard Sitkoff (2009)

As we approach the life and legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. on the 50^th anniversary of his death, April 4, 1968, it is crucial to appreciate King entirely. Beyond his push for nonviolent direct action and racial integration, we should recognize his expansive human rights activism, anti-war advocacy, and ground-breaking thinking.

Harvard Sitkoff’s biography of King shows him as a heroic but flawed leader and emphasizes his radicalism rather than his pacifism. Sitkoff does not shy away from King’s shortcomings. He brings attention to King’s adultery and highlights the criticism he faced from others within the movement. His portrait of King shows him to be a man who made mistakes, feared death, belittled women, gambled, partied, and often compromised. However, it was also clear that King was intelligent, strategic, pious, courageous, radical, well spoken, passionate, and loving at heart. Sitkoff argues that King’s view of the civil rights movement shifted. At the beginning of the movement, the goal was to end Jim Crow and obtain voting rights. However, after King’s experience in the urban north, he knew that the civil rights movement needed to expand to include economic and job security as well as housing reform. By the end of King’s life he was a firm advocate of anti-colonialism and opponent of war and he took a global perspective: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. after meeting with President Johnson to discuss civil rights, at the White House, 1963. Source: Warren K. Leffler, Library of Congress

Stikoff’s book is organized around the key events that shaped King’s leadership. The most compelling argument Stikoff makes is that King was an activist first and then a preacher. He argues that King resisted becoming a pastor and only decided to go into ministry because he knew that it was the best strategic method to get his political agenda across. However, I do think that King was deeply spiritual and used religion to strengthen himself as he became the symbol of the movement and a target of its opponents. King also knew that the south was deeply religious and biblical references would appeal to his supporters. On the other hand, using the black church as the center point for the movement worked in the south but was unsuccessful in the north. De facto segregation complicated urban issues in Chicago and New York, where nonviolent direct action was not as effective as it had been in the south. Shadowing King’s life as the leader of the civil rights movement was was the infamous harassment of the FBI under J. Edgar Hoover. The FBI’s strict surveillance of King was made prevalent throughout the book, which shows how the system that was supposed to protect King was actually out to destroy him.

Reexamining the legacy and life of Martin Luther King gives us insight into the ways that social movements can be used to make radical changes in the United States and the ways those changes can make their leaders into targets.

Student Showcase – The Montgomery Bus Boycott

William Louis
Burkburnett Middle School
Junior Division
Individual Website

In 1955, a collection of citizens in Montgomery, Alabama decided to stand up against the injustice of Jim Crow. Edgar D. Nixon, Martin Luther King and many other activists boycotted the city’s bus system to protest the arrest of Rosa Parks for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger. After 381 days, the bus lines nearly went bankrupt. Ultimately, the city of Montgomery relented and reversed its policy of segregation on its city buses, galvanizing the Civil Rights movement across America.

William Louis, a student at Burkburnett Middle School, contributed to this year’s Texas History Day with a website on this seminal movement, “The Montgomery Bus Boycott.” But this was not just American history for William–it was also family history:

Commuters walking to work instead of riding the buses during the Montgomery bus boycott, 1956 (Don Cravens/Time Life/Getty Images)

As I journeyed through my family history, I discovered that a lot of good things have happened to us. However, we suffered a lot of injustices also. We suffered slavery and discrimination but, also experienced victory and defied the odds of racial barriers. At age six I did a presentation on slavery and how slaves came to America. This was the first time my mom went into detail about slavery, discrimination, and segregation. The more I learned about my family the more I learned about inequality. Since then, I have looked deeper into my family history, researched, read and studied pictures of slave ships as well as the welts on the backs of slaves. Now, at 11, I am just beginning to realize what others went through so I could be where I am right now.

Rosa Parks’ mug shot after being arrested on December 1, 1955 for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus (Wikipedia)

One of the people who helped me understand what African Americans went through was my Grandpa. He told me about having to sit in the back of the bus in Fayetteville, NC, when he was six years old. He told me how he sat at the front of the bus before his cousin snatched him up and took him to the back of the bus, where “the coloreds” belonged.

President Barack Obama sitting in the Montgomery bus where Rosa Parks was arrested. Parks was sitting in the same aisle but on the opposite side. (The White House)

This year’s National History Day is focused the theme Rights and Responsibilities. In America these rights include inalienable rights which are the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. However, blacks were denied these rights. As a result, many courageous people like Rosa Parks, E.D. Nixon, Claudette Clovin, and Martin Luther King took responsibility for the rights of blacks and others who were discriminated against.

More remarkable work from Texas middle and high school students:

A digital history of the trauma of Vietnam

And an account of America’s closest brush with destruction

iTunes Remembers Black History: The New Archive (No. 5)

By Charley S. Binkow

February is Black History month. It is a time for remembrance and reflection for all Americans, but for Historians it is also a rich period for study and research. iTunes U, the academic branch of Apple’s iTunes store, is featuring a vast collection of first-hand oral histories, interviews, and lectures on the extensive history of African Americans.

There are over two dozen podcasts and each one offers a unique perspective on black history: “The Louis Armstrong Jazz Oral History Project” explores the world of African American Jazz, The Gilder Lehrman Institute offers a diverse lecture series on the post Civil War age, and Stanford’s “Modern Freedom Struggle” collects videos on political thought during the Civil Rights movement. The most powerful, collection is Duke University’s “Behind the Veil,” which compiles 100 interviews with African Americans who experienced firsthand the world of segregation in places like Birmingham, New Orleans, Memphis, Albany (GA), and Muhlenberg County. These interviews are as personal and interesting as they are diverse. All the podcasts are free on iTunes and are well worth perusing.

The collection is of value for everyone, from professional historians to amateur history buffs. On top of the primary sources, subscribers can hear engaging and thought provoking lectures from renowned scholars like Eric Foner and James O. Horton. iTunes, is also offering customers a wide selection of outside reading options relating to the topic of Black History, with titles such as The Color Purple, Beloved, Fredrick Douglass’s My Escape from Slavery and Howard Zinn’s On Race.

Overall, the collection does a great job of honoring, remembering, and respecting the struggle of African Americans. The podcasts will keep listeners engaged for days and the interviews give historians hours of first-hand accounts.

If you enjoy these iTunes U collections, be sure to check out our own podcast, 15 Minute History

And explore the latest finds in the NEW ARCHIVE:

Maps and primary documents that change before your very eyes

Harry Houdini’s weird and wild scrapbook collection

Photo Credits:

Screenshot of the iTunes U podcasts and books being featured for Black History History Month

1867 engraving of African American freedmen in New Orleans voting for the first time (Image courtesy of New York Public Library Digital Collection)

Participants in the 1965 civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama (Image courtesy of the Library of Congress)

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